Sun Valley

Beaver - Senior night at Brady's Run Park and the defending Pennsylvania AA Champion Beaver Bobcats were in the celebrating mode. Doug Rheam's upstart Big Macs were not interested because a win would put CM in a tie with the Bobcats for the division lead. After a scoreless first period, Eric Rheam took a pass in stride and could not beat Beaver goaltender Rob Dappenbrook at 13:58. Then Beaver's Ryan Morgan found a loose puck in the slot and scored to make it 1-0. Then with the Bobcats on the power play, Aaron Veydt picked up a rebound goal shorthanded to tie the game at 1-1 at 6:49. Then it was Beaver's Doug Miller pulling the puck between the defenseman's legs and around another defender and deposited a backhanded through the five hole of Watkinson to give Beaver a 2-1 lead at 5:36. The Big Macs knotted the score again as Tom Hunt blistered a long shot past the Beaver goaltender and we were tied again at 2-2. Then at 11:01 of the final period, Veydt wristed one past Dappenbrook to give Canon McMillan its first lead. The Big Macs had a chance to extend the lead on the power play, but could not score. Then Beaver's Adam Krupp took a Morgan pass and buried it with 3:07 remaining. The game went into overtime and Ryan Morgan streaked down the right side and blasted a slapshot by Watkinson with only :08 remaining in OT and Beaver captured its third straight PIHL West Division championship. To secure the future of Beaver Hockey, the faithful freshman players were routing on their leaders. From the Bobcat Freshman team C.J Sheveryn, Andrew Scott, Colby Hawkey, Chris Juba, Alex Bodrie and Brenden Finn were on hand hoping for Bobcat miracle and it was delivered by Captain Morgan.

JOHNSTOWN - Serra and Bishop McCort in a rematch of the 2000 and more recently 2001 Penguin Cup Final. A battle for the # 1 seed in the upcoming Class A Penguin Cup playoffs. Big Game right....Where was Serra star Steve Leppo ? Another meaningless Hornet practice and John Mooney ? No Show and nowhere to be found. Serra was not starting on the right foot. Even though Crusher head coach John Bradley was in the stands serving his last game of a controversial four game suspension issued by the PIHL, which is interesting because they don't follow any of their other rules ! Bishop McCort was focused as they always are for big games at the War Memorial and got off to a great start as Joe Delic scored on a rebound at 13:20 to give his team a 1-0 lead. Serra answered at 8:28 on the power play, after some nice puck movement, C.J. King took a Jesse Lubasch pass and beat Ron Stenger to tie the game. The Crushers took over in the 2nd period as Danny Thomas followed his own rebound and beat Timmy Johnson through the five hole to give McCort a 2-1 lead. Then at 5:57, Delic, on a great individual effort would not be denied as he beat Johnson to extend the lead to 3-1. In the third period, Anthony Feyock held Serra off the board and Bishop McCort earned a huge 3-1 victory. Serra outshot the Crushers 25-24 on the night.

MONROEVILLE - In a tale of two organizations going in opposite directions, Greensburg CC and Woodland Hills squared off, which is sadly probably for the last time. Woodland Hills, with only 15 players rostered, graduates 8 players and with no developmental program is close to extinction as a program after 8 seasons. Greensburg CC, on the other hand is priming itself for a playoff run under long time coach Butch Marrietta. The Centarians received 4 goals from Matt Ward, 3 from Josh Chiado, 2 from Pat Bates and a single from Casey Shoub to rout the Wolverines 10-0. GCC outshot Woodland Hills on the night 42-11. The tell tale of this game was, with a running clock in the third period, Woodland Hills goaltender Brandon White making a great save on a GCC player in front. No one could find the puck and the time ran out and finally surfaced in the Woody High goalie's arm pad. I guess Brandon wasn't going to let GCC score anymore was he.

Stayed home and watched Canada and the Czech Republic !

NEVILLE ISLAND - Montour coach Paul Bonetti was scratching his head prior to his squads game with Latrobe and mainly because the Spartans were punished 7-0 by Keystone Oaks in their last outing. Ron Makoski's Wildcats on the other hand have been impressive in the second half of the season in seizing the PIHL AA East lead. David Fitzgerald got Montour off and running with a one time slapshot past Matt Bloom at 7:44 of the first period. While Montour controlled the play of the period, Latrobe's Nick Loughner nearly tied it with a shot off the crossbar with :35 left in the opening frame. In the second period,Latrobe went on the power play and they should have declined the penalty as Freshwater intercepted an outlet pass and buried a wrist shot upstairs at 12:33 and all the sudden the Spartans were up 2-0. Then, Joe Federoff got into the act as he wheel around the Wildcat goal and fed Fitzgerald in close and he scored to make it 3-0 at 5:41. Tim Armanious scored on a Kevin Lace rebound just forty seconds later to get Latrobe on the board at 3-1, but Montour came right back as Fitzgerald to Freshwater back to Fitzgerald was the recipe for a 4-1 lead at 4:30 of the second. Phil Supan added a power play goal on a pass from Federoff and the Spartans took a commanding 5-1 to the locker room. Fitgerald added his fourth goal of the evening on a slick shot down on the ice at 8:40 of the third period to extend the lead to 6-1. Latrobe's Josh Fajt closed out the scoring at 7:18 to make the final 6-2. Montour's great puck movement proved to be the difference as the Spartans scored a big victory for home ice playoff positioning for the upcoming playoffs.